Democrats hold Giffords’ former seat

As we feared, Democrat Ron Barber has narrowly defeated Republican Martha McSally in Arizona’s Second Congressional District. This is the seat formerly held by Gabrielle Giffords.

McSally led by about 400 voters on the day after the election. But the late-counted vote brought Barber victory by about 1,400 votes in a district that encompasses parts of Tucson and southeastern Arizona and is not identical to the one Giffords represented.

Barber is a career bureaucrat and former Giffords staffer. McSally was the first American woman to fly in combat following the 1991 lifting of the prohibition of women in combat, and the first woman to command a USAF fighter squadron.